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Disinformation: It’s History

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Re: Disinformation: It’s History

#51

Post by jfengel »

BitwiseFool wrote: post #49
jfengel wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eyes have certainly been batted, e.g. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/07/whats-behind-fox-new... I don't know the reaction among Fox News' viewers. It'll be interesting to see if vaccination rates tick up markedly in red districts.

I know a lot of conservative folks. I think people on the left dramatically overestimate how much control and influence Fox News has on the average conservative. Do they have influence? Certainly. But Fox News has been the trendy go-to explanation on the left for why conservatives think or behave a certain way. I also think a lot of people on the left don't yet grasp just how many conservatives are enraged at Fox for…

This is an interesting instance in which to measure that. It's hard to tease out the cause-and-effect here. You get the same thing with politicians: are they saying something to convince their constituents, or are they saying it because their constituents are already saying it and they know it's what they want to hear?

My suspicion is that it's some of each, and I'd bet that the numbers in red districts will rise some, but not a lot. Proportional to the ~2 million Fox News viewers, out of ~80 million people who voted Republican last time. Not that all Fox News viewers will rush out to be vaccinated, but that [say] 25% of them will and influence an equivalent number of non-viewers.

Pulling those numbers out of my ass, of course.

Re: Disinformation: It’s History

#52

Post by Lammy »

jfengel wrote: post #33
kian wrote: post #4

And here I thought the author was making a pithy observation about the fact that history is always written by the victors, and therefor almost always a form of disinformation about the losers.

History isn't always written by the victors. Often, it's written by the losers, who spend time dwelling on it. The most prominent example is the American Civil War, where great effort was made to propagandize it as The Lost Cause. But other examples include German histories of World War I and Thucydides history of the Peloponnesian War. The Onion made a joke out of it, but in a sense it really is an example that the…

> The most prominent example is the American Civil War, where great effort was made to propagandize it as The Lost Cause.

You should look into some of the things that were only able to pass Congress once the Southern states were no longer around to oppose them. The Pacific Railroad Acts are a big example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Railroad_Acts

Re: Disinformation: It’s History

#53

Post by wolverine876 »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #48
wolverine876 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not even sure what this means or what it's based on. Are human institutions imperfect? Absolutely, but that's all we have. Is democracy perfectly responsive or unresponsive? Of course not. But the track record of democracies is orders of magnitude beyond any other form of government. Look at all the most free, most prosperous, most safe countries in the history of the world - all exist now, and all are advanced d…

> But the track record of democracies is orders of magnitude beyond any other form of government. To be fair, what the USSR did between their revolution in 1917 and, oh, somewhere around 1975 was completely amazing. They took a fundamentally feudal, largely agragian society and turned it into an industrial world power. In terms of economic well-being, health, safety and possibility, for most USSR citizens it was a hu…

> what the USSR did between their revolution in 1917 and, oh, somewhere around 1975 was completely amazing

Tens of millions died of starvation, more died in wars, more suffered brutal oppression, forced relocation, and had no freedom to live their lives or even speak their mind, not to mention widespread poverty. What was accomplished for those people?

We're not talking about 'methods', but outcomes. The outcome is all those people dying and suffering. You found a silver lining? Wow. Democracies provided much more prosperity (how about just a reliable food supply) without the nightmarish horrors. 'Much of my family died, ended up in brutal prisons, were forced to relocate, suffered brutal oppression - but it's all good because I have some material goods I didn't have 60 years ago.'

The former USSR is still well behind the democracies.

> you could try to argue that they only succeeded at immense cost to both human lives and political freedom - I might not even disagree

These are the justifications of people who want power over others, it's well-worn propaganda: - 'I am needed to solve the problem, and my self-serving sadism is necessary'. You have examples, worldwide, of countries doing more economically, without the horrors, through freedom. Government leaders, chosen by the people, who do things without killing their population or oppressing them. What a joke.

If these brutal dictators are so good for the population, why not hold elections? Who decides that they are good?

> China over the last 35 years is likely a similar example.

China did it through liberalization, economic and (until somewhat recently) political, starting under Deng Xiaoping.

And Taiwan and Hong Kong, which embraced true freedom, did far more.

Re: Disinformation: It’s History

#54

Post by cogman10 »

gunfighthacksaw wrote: post #45

When I think about Jan 06 2021 and all of the various perspectives on that, there is one thought that I cannot get away from. All of this is occurring in a world with widespread surveillance, instant archival of media and technology to ensure integrity of the archives. What about, say, the American revolution? How reliable are the narratives from 1776? 1867? 1918? 1989? Apologies if you think I’m being flippant about…

Congratulations, you now understand the merits of critical race theory.

The main thesis of CRT is that a major portion of US laws and institutions were created in the context of slave ownership and outright racism. That makes a lot of people uncomfortable, so they prefer to whitewash the history instead of addressing it and thinking of the ramifications.

A great example of this is HOAs. The original intent of HOAs was to keep PoC out of the neighborhoods.

This is a little bit of a tangent but I think it runs into the same root cause of Jan 6 and the current perceptions of it. If you are on the left you see it as an insurrection of try and stop or interrupt the democratic process. If you are on the right you see it as patriots trying to stop an unfair election and preserve the american way of life.

However, deep down, it really comes down to a more base and fundamental aspect of humans. We like to be part of our groups and organizations. That makes us blind or dismissive to faults of our group. Cognitive dissonance is one hell of a drug.

CRT battles the same problem. We don't like seeing historical "good guys" as having flaws.

Re: Disinformation: It’s History

#55

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

wolverine876 wrote: post #53
PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But the track record of democracies is orders of magnitude beyond any other form of government. To be fair, what the USSR did between their revolution in 1917 and, oh, somewhere around 1975 was completely amazing. They took a fundamentally feudal, largely agragian society and turned it into an industrial world power. In terms of economic well-being, health, safety and possibility, for most USSR citizens it was a hu…

> what the USSR did between their revolution in 1917 and, oh, somewhere around 1975 was completely amazing Tens of millions died of starvation, more died in wars, more suffered brutal oppression, forced relocation, and had no freedom to live their lives or even speak their mind, not to mention widespread poverty. What was accomplished for those people? We're not talking about 'methods', but outcomes. The outcome is a…

I don't disagree with any of your description of the negatives about what the USSR did. I regret that the way I worded this definitely appears that I was somehow giving the USSR a pass on all this.

The question is whether or not those aspects of the USSR's "development" were critical/integral to their industrialization and modernization or not.

If they were, then I think that makes the price of those changes in the USSR clearly too high.

If they were not, then they are terrible, terrible things, happening alongside something quite remarkable.

I don't know enough about the details of the USSR during that time period to know how integral they may have been.

I also don't know enough about the history of South Korea to know if their development is comparable to what happened in the USSR or not. My vague impression is that they were starting from a much better (non-Tsarist) place, but I could have that wrong.

Re: Disinformation: It’s History

#56

Post by Fellshard »

jokoon wrote: post #23
chadanon wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Claiming truth doesn't exist as fact is a truthy statement. Claiming objectivity doesn't exist is a contradiction.

Pure objectivity doesn't really exist.

People cannot be purely objective.

That does not mean there is no objective truth.

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